Freemont is like a Redball episode on the TV program, Homicide. The city councilman's grandson just got shot, so bring all hands to the fore, stat, and spare no expense. The press is going to be at the front door in a few minutes, and they'll want answers. How many times will they redo Freemont, may I ask, before they get it right?
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T faces a conundrum of sorts when they decide to deploy their new sub-75 home fix. If we put their showpiece Freemont aside, for the moment, they cannot economically go back into already recently re-worked areas a second or third time, without giving the original HFCs in those areas (and their most recent heirs, in some cases) time to depreciate.
Ironically, these are the very same areas that are the most potentially lucrative, and hence the reason for their being done first in the first place. And, at the same time they are most in need of the extra bandwidth availability at the individual user level due to the profiles of users in those areas.
This translates as follows: They will most likely use the newer sub-75 architecture to complete the remainder of their HFC buildout agenda, for the most part, at first, which means that they will first deploy the sub-75s in those areas which are still purely coaxial-based. To do otherwise would be tantamount to prematurely retiring untold millions in recently installed amplified plant. Keep in mind that the sub-75 model uses no amplifiers, when done optimally.
How long will it take T to redo their regional networks with the new 75 home architecture? To a great extent the answer to this lies in how much remaining plant needs to undergo their first upgrades, still, and the remainder has to do with the depreciation formulae they are using.
AND, whether or not they can reuse (push to other areas) some of the electronic wares that they have already installed in some of the first HFCs which were put in by TCI. Beyond these factors, divide 60,000,000 homes by 75, and you wind up with a staggering number of field jobs to administer: We're talking about close to a million re-grooming exercises to be executed in the bush.
These will take some time to complete. By giving them "a few years" to complete this feat is actually being overly optimistic. In any event, doing 800,000 reconfigs in the field will not be done overnight.
Here's where companies like IFCI come into play. IF, and that's a big IF, T truly wants to pull all the stops and go for the gold.
As you know, I am all for a new deeper fiber model coming out of this, too. But I don't think that it's going to be a cake walk getting there through this means. But I could be wrong. It all depends on whether or not Armstrong takes a damn the torpedoes stance. He probably wont, since T is already into cable for over $120 Billion already. Comments welcome. |
